English Learners Put High-Tech Blackboards to New Use

Emily Alpert:

Small hands flock into the air, fluttering before the oversized computer screen. Teacher Maria Vazquez picks a first-grader from the crowd. She bounds up to the interactive board, takes the stylus from Vazquez' outstretched hand, and neatly highlights a few Spanish words, touching the tool to the 6-foot-wide screen. There's no ink, no paper, no projectors -- just the wide, kid-level touch screen, upon which every child's eyes are fixed.

With that screen, Vazquez can conjure up images from the web, play videos, display textbook pages, give and grade quizzes, craft diagrams and broker chats with kids from afar; she can swap notes and lessons with fellow teachers, track students' answers and how fast they respond. Hours spent grading are a thing of the past. Kids are rapt before the glowing screen.

Posted by Jim Zellmer at February 14, 2008 12:00 AM
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